Abstract Art
by burkygirl
Summary: "I remind myself to breathe. Ry is impulsive, independent and kind of spoiled. We didn't mean to do it. But he's our miracle. We could have lost him so easily, and every time I look at him I remember what we went through to keep him." A ficlet about pregnancy complications that ends happily.


"Ryan Peeta Mellark!"

My three-year old son scurries into the kitchen in his sock feet. His mop of blonde curls doesn't quite mask the mischief in the grey eyes that peer up at me. I take a deep breath and pray for patience.

"Someone drew all over the wall in the dining room. Do you know anything about that?"

His rosebud lips twist while he considers his answer. He's entirely too charming. "Did you asth Wi-woah?"

"Willow is at school, Ry," I remind him. "Try again."

Ry's eyes flick to the dining room and then his face lights up in a smile. "Oh! You mean my murwole? Daddy thed we could paint one in the dining room. I hewlped! I did it awl by mysewlf."

I remind myself to breathe. I'm going to have to have a word with Peeta about saying things like that in front of Ry. He's impulsive, independent and kind of spoiled.

We didn't mean to do it. But he's our miracle. We could have lost him so easily, and every time I look at him I remember what we went through to keep him.

Incompetent cervix. That's the phrase the doctor used when Willow arrived into the world at 30 weeks. He droned on and on about what that meant for future children and successful pregnancies, but I hadn't paid attention at the time. My heart had just been removed from my body and placed inside an incubator, where it was covered in tubes and hoses. Peeta clutched my hand as we sat side by side in the dimmed room full of beeping lights and whispering nurses. We slipped our free hands through the arm holes in the incubator to stroke whatever bit of exposed skin we could find and waited for our chance to hold her.

When they placed her feather-light frame into my arms, Peeta wrapped his arms around us both and peered over my shoulder. My fingers trembled when I reached out to stroke the tuft of dark hair on the top of her head. She sighed contentedly and I smiled into blue eyes that were exactly like her father's. Tears trailed freely down our cheeks as we took turns holding her tiny body against our bare chests. And, after six weeks of anxiety and sleepless nights in the rocking chair beside her, we finally got to take her home, completely terrified and desperately in love.

Willow was barely walking when we decided to have another. It took me almost no time to get pregnant again. I knew as soon as I started dreaming of him - blonde hair, grey eyes, a cheeky grin. When we went to the doctor to confirm the at-home test, he sat us down and told us about the long road we were about to go down. All the symptoms and complications I hadn't been able to take in when Willow was born ricocheted through my head. Early dilation. Potential miscarriage. Bed rest.

I remember dragging Peeta out of the doctor's office and into the parking lot. I had to get out of that room. All of my dreams for our new baby were crashing down around my head and I could not be there when they shattered against the ground. I made it all the way to our Honda and was reaching out to open the door when he pulled me back.

"Hey," he murmured. "Come here." In seconds, I was folded in his arms and sobbing against his chest. His hands slid up my back and his cheek rested against my head. "It will be okay," he whispered. "We have each other. We have Willow, and we'll have this baby too. We just have to be careful." It wasn't until my tears soaked through his shirt that I raised my head and realized Peeta was crying too.

I was only 18 weeks along when I woke up and saw the spotting. I was hyperventilating by the time I managed to make my fingers dial the numbers to reach Peeta at the bakery. His father told me later that Peeta walked away from an entire mixer full of bread dough, only stopping long enough to throw his apron at him before running out the door.

I was on bed rest after that, and left alone from early morning until mid afternoon when Peeta came home from work. I slept as much as possible while he was gone to avoid dwelling on my fears. I'd get out of bed to open the window so that I could listen to the wind and the birds and then slam it back down because it was driving me crazy that I couldn't get outside. At 20 weeks they told me that I was still dilating, and so they stitched my cervix closed and sent me back to bed.

About three days after the procedure, I was lying in bed reading what felt like the tenth book that week when I heard Peeta pull in from work. I looked up from my Kindle to see his friend Finnick pull in behind him. My friend Gale was parking his truck out on the street, with a load of lumber on the back. Finnick and Peeta disappeared into our garage and returned with tool belts around their waists, a power saw and some sawhorses.

The boys all stood around discussing a plan that Peeta pulled from his back pocket. Gale, who worked for his dad's construction company, pointed things out and Peeta and Finnick nodded. Peeta whipped out a pencil from over his ear and altered the plans.

Before long, the air was filled with roaring saws, pounding hammers and whining drills, broken only periodically for them to converge on the porch, where I couldn't see them, before starting up again. After a couple of hours, I heard the door bang downstairs and I sat up in bed, waiting for the familiar sound of Peeta's heavy tread on the stairs. Instead, the fridge door swung open and shut and the front door slammed again. I watched as my husband handed out cold beer to his compadres. Gale must have made a joke because they all laughed hysterically. The traitor. I scowled, my eyes flicking to the clock. It was almost time to pick Willow up from daycare and Peeta still hadn't bothered to come upstairs to say hello or even discuss the renovation project going on outside - one he'd clearly been planning while I was imprisoned in our bedroom. I could hear them on the front steps, grunting 'have ya got it' at each other, followed by a dragging noise. When the ruckus stopped half an hour later, I finally lost it. He hadn't picked up Willow. He hadn't even asked me about whatever they were doing, and now he couldn't be bothered with coming up stairs to explain.

"Peeta!" I screamed. "Get up here!"

It wasn't long before a blonde head peeked in the door. "You bellowed?"

I crossed my arms and scowled. "You need to go get Willow. She's going to think we forgot her. I can't believe the daycare hasn't called wondering where we are yet."

Peeta leaned against the doorframe. "Madge has got her. I set it up with the daycare yesterday."

Something snapped inside me. "You mean to tell me that _Gale's_ wife knows whatever is going on down there and you can't be bothered with even mentioning it to me?"

He grinned at me and crossed to the bed. "I honestly didn't think you'd last all afternoon. I was sure you'd give me a blast when I came in for the beer."

"I can't believe you didn't come upstairs." I was pouting. I knew it and didn't care. I was fat and bored and lonely. Peeta reached down and scooped me up.

"Well, come on, Rapunzel," he said as he adjusted me in his arms. "Let's go see your surprise."

I wasn't ready to be appeased. "Don't try to charm me, Peeta. If I had a frying pan right now, you'd know just how much like Rapunzel I can be." He snickered as we started down the stairs and then bellowed for Finnick to open the door. Finnick's green eyes danced as he peered at me through the screen. Gale was leaning against the porch rail, one workboot crossed over the other. He gave me a salute and inclined his head to the end of the porch with a grin.

There, suspended on thick white ropes was a hanging bed, complete with a mattress and fluffy pillows.

"I thought that the next 10 or so weeks might be easier if you could spend them outside," Peeta said as he settled me on the swing. When I burst into tears, the boys cleared out and left Peeta to mop me up.

The rest of the spring slipped by and at 32 weeks, I was finally allowed to get out of bed. At 36 weeks, Ry arrived. Happy, healthy and completely normal.

And now, here he stands, with absolutely no idea of what he could possibly have done wrong.

"Didn't you wike my murwole, Mama?" His lip quivers.

"I think maybe you should have waited for Daddy, sweetie. He might have had a plan that we don't know about." My gaze flicks to the bed swing I can see outside the kitchen window. "He does that sometimes."

The silver eyes water. "But I wanted to supwise him," says my baby.

I sigh. He won't be a baby much longer. Just yesterday, Willow sassed me as she went out the door on her way to school. She sounded sixteen years old. I rummage in the drawer and pull out a big black Sharpie.

"Come on, Ry-pie. Let's go make abstract art. Daddy can paint it when he gets home."


End file.
